


marvelous radio, wonderful radio

by brideofquiet



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: (unrelated to the sex), Alien Invasion, Aliens, Anal Sex, Comedy, End of the World, Established Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Playful Sex, Pre-Captain America: The First Avenger, Pre-World War II Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers, Radio, [shakes fist at Orson Welles] you wily bastard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2018-12-15
Packaged: 2019-09-19 18:08:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17006583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brideofquiet/pseuds/brideofquiet
Summary: “They say something about Mars?” Bucky says, spit trailing off his lip.“Huh?” Steve grunts.“On the radio.”“Is now really the time, Buck? For Mars?”





	marvelous radio, wonderful radio

**Author's Note:**

> Orson Welles' dramatization of the science-fiction novel "War of the Worlds" by H.G. Wells aired live on CBS radio on October 30, 1938. Most of it was formatted like a newscast, which caused, uh, some problems! I suggested on [twitter](https://twitter.com/bride_ofquiet) that it'd be funny if Steve and Bucky heard the program and misinterpreted it like so many others did, people agreed, and here we are.

The radio crackles and fizzes like the death wheeze of an electrocuted rat.

“We gotta get that thing fixed,” Bucky mutters somewhere in the vicinity of Steve’s armpit.

 _“We_ gotta?” Steve says.

Bucky heaves a sigh. His breath is hot against Steve’s exposed skin where his undershirt’s rucked up practically to his nose. “Yeah, yeah,” Bucky says and crawls over Steve to reach the radio, where it sits on the bookshelf. He fiddles with the dial, and the fuzzing gets worse. “Shit.”

This new position settles Bucky’s hips too close to Steve’s face for him to resist doing _something._ He gets exactly two fingers on Bucky’s trouser buttons before Bucky swats his his hand away.

“Excuse me,” Steve says and tries again.

“Quit that.”

 _“Excuse_ me.”

“I’m trying to fix your damn radio—leave my dick alone for a minute, would you?”

“Wow.”

Bucky sits properly on him then, as good as pinning Steve’s arms to the couch. There’s a sharp knock like he’d picked the radio up and banged it against the bookshelf and then—

 _“Now a tune that never loses favor,”_ comes the radio, _“the ever popular ‘Star Dust.’ Ramon Raquello and his orchestra…”_

“There,” Bucky says, satisfied. He drops his gaze to Steve beneath him. “Now where were we?”

 _“You_ were somewhere near my left nipple.”

“Oh, of course, how could I forget?”

Bucky slithers back down the couch and reattaches himself to Steve’s front with renewed energy, now that the radio seems to be playing music instead of just static. They’ve been lying on the couch necking for most of the afternoon, in no real hurry for it to lead anywhere else. A lazy Sunday afternoon in the truest since, Steve had only bothered putting on trousers so he could go get the mail. The weather’s been too hot to bother, like the summer got confused about which door was the exit and decided to just stay a while instead like some kind of socially awkward houseguest.

It’s past eight now. If they’re going to get on with it at some point before the day’s over and the work week begins again, it’ll have to be soon. But Bucky’s mouth alone does feel so exceptionally good, and it’s been too long since they’ve just kissed and kissed like this. Once Bucky had finally given up his good boy act and let Steve take his pants off back in the spring, he’s been hard-pressed to keep them on for any substantial length of time. Steve can’t help it—he’s barely twenty, in his prime, and Bucky’s ass is just so grabbable.

In fact—

“Geez, Steve!” Bucky gasps.

“Oh golly gee, Buck, did that pinch?”

“I’m gonna pinch you, see how you like it, huh?”

“Wish you would.”

They don’t notice when the orchestra music cuts out, replaced by a news bulletin. It’s back soon enough, and Bucky’s hands are too busy shucking Steve’s underpants off to bother switching to a more consistent station anyway. Steve’s not really supposed to touch the radio on account of how he’s “really just a klutz with electronics, Steve, I don’t know how you even do it.”

So maybe he broke the radio. Bucky’ll fix it; it’s fine.

“They say something about Mars?” Bucky says, spit trailing off his lip.

“Huh?” Steve grunts.

“On the radio.”

“Is now really the time, Buck? For Mars?”

“Right, sorry.” And then Bucky’s head disappears between Steve’s legs again, where he probably can’t hear much with the way Steve always grips his head with his thighs like the world’s gentlest nutcracker. Steve has broken Bucky’s brain before, but it wasn’t with his thighs.

Anyways—now they’re getting somewhere. Steve feels like he’s been reducing over low heat all day, like making jam, and now he’s hot and sweet and ready to be eaten. Thankfully, Bucky’s already taking care of that. The inside of his mouth is soft and warm and just the right kind of excruciating, and now that he’s actually figured out what to do with a cock in his mouth, he knows how to show some restraint and make this last. Christ, but Steve hopes he never ever gets used to this.

“You’re good, sugar, so good at this,” Steve says, and Bucky’s eyes flick up to meet his. Normally Steve might take offense at the amused glint in Bucky’s eyes—he thinks it’s downright comedy gold the way Steve starts to babble when he’s getting close—but then again, he’s close, and he can’t be bothered right now. Someone else is chattering too, a voice on the radio; the music must have switched to a news program. But Steve can’t hear very well on the best day, much less when Bucky’s sucking his brain out through his dick with two fingers snug inside him for good measure, so he’s not paying much attention.

“Mm, _oh,_ who knew, huh?” Steve pants. “You were made for… Bucky, Buck, shit—oh come _on._ Really, Bucky?”

Bucky laughs into the skin of Steve’s thigh, where he’d put his mouth when he abruptly pulled off just seconds before Steve came. He blows a raspberry on Steve’s knee, a proper loud one, and _giggles_ about it because he knows how much Steve hates that. Steve tries to wriggle away from him, then realizes that with Bucky’s fingers still inside him, the wriggling feels pretty good, actually, so he keeps doing it until Bucky wises up to him and pulls his fingers away too.

“I oughta smack you,” Steve says.

“Go ahead,” Bucky says, sitting back on his heels. At least he’s finally unbuttoning his trousers, but Steve still stretches forward to clob him on the back of the head. “Ow, hey!”

“You told me to!”

“Now you’re in for it, Rogers.”

“Finally.”

The rest of Bucky’s clothes fly to the floor as he undresses with uncharacteristic roughness, but there’s a grin still plastered to his face. “How you want it?” he asks, grabbing Steve by the thighs to pull his hips further down the couch. God, but this thing needs to be steam-cleaned by now, or maybe just burned. “Want me to be real slow and gentle?”

A sound not unlike a growl tears out of Steve’s throat, and he catches the back of Bucky’s neck to haul him down for a kiss. His monthly allotment of patience ran out sometime in the past five minutes. He kisses Bucky how he wants it: hot, slick, untender. Bucky responds in kind, his hands still splayed on Steve’s legs pushing them up till their hips are aligned just right. He slides in without preamble or warning. Steve gasps, head falling back against the couch cushion, and it takes him ten full seconds to remember that this is the part where he’s supposed to relax. It takes a few deep breaths and Bucky laving at his neck before Steve taps Bucky’s hip, contracting pointedly at the place where they’re fused.

Bucky grips the armrest with one hand to brace himself, the other pinning Steve’s hand to the couch cushion, and starts to move.

He’s about five powerful thrusts in when he pauses and cocks his head to the side.

“Bucky, seriously, if you don’t stop teasing me—”

“Shh,” Bucky says, and then has the audacity to actually press a finger to Steve’s lips. “Coulda swore the newscaster just said something about a heat ray.”

“Do you not wanna have sex with me right now? Because if you’d rather fantasize about science—”

Bucky rolls his eyes, and then rolls his hips, and that shuts Steve up pretty effectively. God, Steve had been aware the man could move, but he hadn’t _known,_ not till this. Bucky’s got a lot going for him, but Steve’s pretty sure his dick is at least top five—maybe even top three.

It’s only a few minutes later when Bucky stops again and sits up, and Steve is all prepared to flip over or climb in his lap or whatever the hell new position he wants, but Bucky’s face is pure concern.

“What? Am I bleeding again?” Steve asks, slapping a hand to his face to wipe under his nose, but his fingers come away clean, thank God. “What is it?”

“Listen,” Bucky says, pointing.

Steve cranes his neck around to get an eyeful of the radio, which shifts his hips enough to make him groan. Bucky sets a hand on his middle to still him, his frown deepening. How he has the wherewithal to pay any attention to anything besides his dick in Steve’s ass is beyond Steve, but apparently they’re not about to get back to fucking any time in the next few minutes, so he may as well try to listen to whatever’s caught Bucky’s ears.

 _“Ladies and gentleman, I have a grave announcement to make,”_ says the radio announcer. _“Incredible as it may seem, both the observations of science and the evidence of our eyes lead to the inescapable assumption that those strange beings who landed in the Jersey farmlands tonight are the vanguard of an invading army from the planet Mars.”_

“What the hell?” Steve laughs.

“Can it,” Bucky whispers, his face gone pale and blank.

Steve sits up too, wincing when Bucky slides out of him, and then Bucky’s reaching over him to crank the volume dial up nearly as high as it will go.

_“The battle which took place tonight at Grovers Mill has ended in one of the most startling defeats ever suffered by any army in modern times; seven thousand men armed with rifles and machine guns pitted against a single fighting machine of the invaders from Mars. One hundred and twenty known survivors. The rest strewn over the battle area from Grovers Mill to Plainsboro, crushed and trampled to death under the metal feet of the monster, or burned to cinders by its heat ray…”_

“Is this—” Steve starts, turning toward Bucky. “This can’t be real, can it?”

“It’s a newscast, Steve.”

“But it’s… It’s a joke. It has to be. Aliens aren’t real.”

Bucky’s mouth presses into a flat line, his brow parallel above it. The newscast goes on to describe the monster’s path of destruction across New Jersey, the downed power lines, the traffic as people try to flee its trajectory—a trajectory they may very well be sitting right in the middle of, bare-ass naked on the couch.

The radio fuzzes out into electric static. Something cold settles in Steve’s gut.

“Bucky,” Steve says uneasily, “do you think we ought to…”

Bucky springs to life before Steve has a chance to finish his question. He darts into the bedroom, and there’s the sound of dresser drawers opening and closing with too much force. Steve’s barely gotten his mouth closed by the time Bucky barrels back into the room, throwing clothes at him while he tries to button his own shirt one-handed.

“Get dressed, come on,” Bucky says.

Steve gets his clothes on quickly but ineptly, and he’s sure he looks as askew as Bucky does, still flushed and sweaty from the sex they might never get to finish. His hair’s all rucked up from where Steve was doing his best to keep from pulling it right out of his scalp, but it’s not like that matters, in the grand scheme of things. Who’s gonna stop to notice their sex hair while the world is ending?

“We gotta make sure everyone knows,” Steve says, “try to help who we can.”

“Yeah,” Bucky says, nodding, still looking a little dazed. “Okay, okay, shoes on, we gotta get moving.”

There’s already some commotion in the hall, others neighbors sticking their heads out to see what’s going on. Mrs. Krenshaw says something about the basement, and a few people start shuffling down the stairs with far less urgency than the situation really warrants. Steve urges them to shake their tail feathers while Bucky knocks on other doors.

“I’m gonna go check the street,” Bucky says once their hall is empty, “clear it if anyone’s out there.”

“I’ll come with you,” Steve says.

“No, you should—”

“Bucky,” Steve says, grabbing him by the shoulder. “I’m coming with you.”

Something shifts in Bucky’s face as he understands, the earth moving and settling again. “Okay,” he says softly, and takes Steve by the hand. “Come on.”

Their block is blessedly deserted already, and Steve is thinking, if everyone just stays inside, maybe if the whole entire city plays dead then they’ll be spared from—from heat rays, and monsters tall as the sky, holy shit, what’s the world coming to—

“Steve!” Bucky gasps as they’re headed back for their building and the basement.

“What?”

“My ma—the girls—”

“Shit, okay, we can call them, right? Don’t—hey!” Steve grabs Bucky by the back of the shirt and hauls him backward; he’d been trying to take off up the street. “You can’t run to them! It’s too far!”

“Steve, that’s my _family.”_      

“I know, look, we’ll go inside and use the phone in the hall, okay? But you can’t run ten blocks across Brooklyn right now, I’m sorry, I’m not gonna let you.”

Bucky braces fingers at his temple, but after a few long seconds, he nods and follows Steve back inside. There’s no line at the phone; their building has gone silent. Bucky dials the number for his family’s building with shaking fingers, and Steve wraps an arm around his waist to hold him steady.

“Ma,” Bucky gasps when someone picks up, “it’s Bucky—Barnes—is that you, Ma?”

He’s quiet for half a second, then: “And the girls? Are they all home with you?”

Bucky breathes out a sigh of relief and sags against the wall, wrapping his free arm around Steve. Probably everyone in the building is wise to the two of them already, but if there ever was a time to forget they’re supposed to keep that quiet, it’s now. Steve presses as close to Bucky as he can.

“Have you heard what’s going on?” Bucky asks. “On the radio. With the—in New Jersey, the monster from Mars. … What do you mean, what am I talking about? Ma, go turn on the radio and listen, seven thousand people are already dead and it could be headed here.”

A long pause. The crease in Bucky’s forehead deepens.

“Becca says it’s a… what? No, no, Ma, I heard it.”

Steve frowns up at him, a silent question, but Bucky just shakes his head.

“I don’t understand. So you’re saying it’s just—” Bucky’s breath punches out of him. “Oh, holy fuckin shit.”

Bucky’s mother’s voice buzzes on the other end, probably berating him for cursing.

“Sorry, Ma. You’re sure? Without a doubt, absolutely positive? Becca doesn’t always… Yeah. Oh, holy Christ on a—sorry, I know, I’m workin on it. Okay. Geez. … Yeah, I love you too. I’ll come see you sometime this week. … Oh right, I forgot tomorrow’s Halloween. The girls got costumes? … _Yes,_ I’ll bring Steve, don’t I always? … Okay. Okay, goodbye now, Ma.”

Bucky hangs up the phone and immediately covers his face with his hand. It doesn’t do much to hide the heavy blush spreading over his cheeks, though.

“Bucky, what…?”

“You’re gonna kill me.”

“Because?”

“The whole thing was… uh, a radioplay.”

“The whole what?”

Bucky drops his hand, only to throw it up in the air, exasperated. “The—Steve, the aliens! The people dying, New Jersey, all of it’s just a goddamn radioplay.”

“A radioplay,” Steve deadpans.

Bucky’s face scrunches apologetically. He tries for a smile. “Guess we oughta get everyone out of the basement.”

Very calmly, Steve extricates himself from Bucky’s grip and promptly turns on his heel. He heads for the stairwell, his shoes thumping rhythmically on the wood floor.

“Steve? Where you going?”

“To put all your science fiction novels in a pile,” Steve says. “And then burn them.”

“Steve, no!” Bucky shouts, half-laughing, and sprints down the hall after him.

Steve takes mercy on Bucky’s books, but only after Bucky agrees to finish what he started more than an hour ago. They actually make it to the bed for once, and whether it’s the comedown from the stress of imminent annihilation, the fact that he’s been waiting literally all day for this, or Bucky working extra hard to make it up to him—it might be the best orgasm he’s ever had.

“Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if aliens really did invade the planet,” Steve says hazily sometime after he’s resurfaced. “Might be kind of exciting.”

“Okay, see, you say that,” Buck says from where he’s sprawled at the foot of the bed, “and then you won’t read any of the books I tell you to.”

“Well maybe I’d read a book like that radioplay.”

“Uh…”

“Bucky.” Steve narrows his eyes at the ceiling. When Bucky says nothing, Steve prods him in the gut with his big toe. “Are you telling me that program was based on a book?”

“Well, you see—”

“Have you _read it?”_

“Look, I read it when I was about ten, so excuse me for not remembering—”

The rest of his sentence gets drowned out by what winds up being a very poor attempt at smothering on Steve’s part.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Seven and seventy-four years later, after Steve punches yet another honest-to-actual-God alien in the face, he takes a brief moment to look skyward and vow that if he ever sees Bucky Barnes again, he’s going to hit him over the head with a copy of H.G. Wells’ _War of the Worlds._  


**Author's Note:**

> The "couple has sex while NPR plays in the background" is one of my favorite jokes. Also shout out to [steebadore](https://archiveofourown.org/users/steebadore) for that ending.
> 
> More on the "War of the Worlds" panic: The program was an episode of the radio drama anthology series "The Mercury Theatre on the Air" and opened with a clear introduction explaining that it was a work of fiction. The popular theory is that, as above, many people tuned in late or weren't paying attention until, hm, this news bulletin seems to be saying that aliens are destroying the world. And thus, panic ensued! Reports vary about how much actual mass hysteria the episode caused, as not many people actually listened to it, but the people who did were _pissed_ and CBS caught a lot of flack for airing it. Later that night, the lighted bulletin of the New York Times would read "ORSON WELLES CAUSES PANIC." Welles would, of course, go on to be an incredibly successful film director.
> 
> You can listen to the "War of the Worlds" broadcast [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzC3Fg_rRJM), or read the transcript[here](https://casn.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/resource_files/War_of_Worlds_script.pdf).


End file.
